The accounts of the battle of Omdurman now dropping in
from officers present leave no doubt in any mind as to the source of the Mandi's, or his successor the Khalifa's, power. His followers, the Baggara tribe more especially, were some of the most magnificent soldiers in the world. The accounts are unanimous as to their courage, which exceeded that of the best European troops. They marched on death with disdainful confidence, bore being mown down in swathes without halting, and but that they were faced by men clothed in the enchanted armour of modern science, would infallibly have destroyed the Anglo-Egyptian army. Cavalry or infantry, they were all alike, heroes incapable of fear, absolutely obedient, and entirely reckless of death. The reader who studies the accounts understands for the first time how the "Moors," who were just these men, swept over the soldiers of the Lower Empire, what Charles Martel had to resist at Tours, and how the Crusaders, the picked chivalry of Europe, were ultimately defeated by the "Saracens." It is all " fanaticism," it is said. Fanaticism helps, but we take it the truth is that the Arabs pure, the half-caste Arabs, and almost all Africans, whether Sondanese, Zulus, or IHaussas, are among the best material for soldiers to be found in the world. If the " savages " of Africa had but a great leader, repeating rifles, and Maxims, Europe might once more be in danger of being submerged in a flood of barbarism. Her children would be like animals fighting the red dogs of the Deccan, overwhelmed by a rush which it is impossible to stop except by universal slaughter.
